The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Monday stressed that hand sanitizers are not meant to be ingested.
In a statement, the agency said that they are happy that more manufacturers are making hand sanitizer to help get the product to consumers.
But they stressed that “hand sanitizers … not for ingestion, inhalation, or intravenous use.”
They are asking makers of sanitizers to make them in a way that is unpalatable to people, especially young children, by advising manufacturers to use denatured alcohol, which makes the product more bitter and less appealing to drink.
“We appreciate industry’s willingness to help supply alcohol-based hand sanitizer to the market to meet the increasing demand for these products and are grateful for their efforts. With this increased supply comes our continued mission to ensure safety of these products,” FDA Commissioner Stephen M. Hahn, M.D. said in a statement
“It is important that hand sanitizer be manufactured in a way that makes them unpalatable to people, especially young children, and that they are appropriately labeled to discourage accidental or intentional ingestion. Additionally, hand sanitizers are not proven to treat covid-19, and like other products meant for external use, are not for ingestion, inhalation, or intravenous use.”
The agency said they received a report of a 13-year-old child becoming sick from drinking hand sanitizer packaged in a liquor bottle from a distiller. (They did not share details of where the incident occurred.)
The hand sanitizer was not denatured and was reported to taste like normal drinking alcohol. Also the product did not have a warning label.
The FDA is also concerned about hand sanitizer products being sold by some manufacturers during the covid-19 pandemic with unproven claims.
The statement follows President Donald Trump’s recent comments on whether sunlight and using disinfectants might treat covid-19.
Many distilleries and other companies began making hand sanitizers to give to people after supplies became hard to find amid the coronavirus pandemic, as fear of the coronavirus led people to stock up on the gel.
The alcohol-based gel is convenient, but hand sanitizer isn’t the best way to clean your hands. For that, soap and water still is still best.
